The Defiant Ones is a 1958 American drama film which tells the story of two escaped prisoners, one white and one black, who are shackled together and who must co-operate in order to survive. It stars Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier.
The Harlem Globetrotters are an American exhibition basketball team. They combine athleticism, theater, entertainment, and comedy in their style of play. Over the years, they have played more than 26,000 exhibition games in 124 countries and territories, mostly against deliberately ineffective opponents, such as the Washington Generals and the New York Nationals (1995–2015). The team's signature song is Brother Bones' whistled version of "Sweet Georgia Brown", and their mascot is an anthropomorphized globe named "Globie". The team is owned by Herschend Family Entertainment.
Abraham Michael Saperstein was the founder, owner and earliest coach of the Harlem Globetrotters. Saperstein was a leading figure in black basketball and baseball from the 1920s through the 1950s, primarily before those sports were racially integrated.
The Washington Generals are an American basketball team who play exhibition games against the Harlem Globetrotters. The team has also played under several aliases in their history as the Globetrotters' perennial opponents.
Reece "Goose" Tatum was an American Negro league baseball and basketball player. In 1942, he was signed to the Harlem Globetrotters and had an 11-year career with the team. He later formed his own team known as the Harlem Magicians with former Globetrotters player Marques Haynes. He is a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame. Tatum's number 50 is retired by the Globetrotters.
Dane Clark was an American character actor who was known for playing, as he labeled himself, "Joe Average."
Marques Haynes was an American professional basketball player and member of the Harlem Globetrotters, notable for his ability to dribble the ball and keep it away from defenders. According to the 1988 film Harlem Globetrotters: Six Decades of Magic, Haynes could dribble the ball as many as 348 times a minute.
The Chicago Majors were a basketball team based in Chicago, Illinois, that was a member of the American Basketball League from 1961 to 1963.
The Jesse Owens Story is a 1984 American two-part, four-hour made-for-television biographical film about the black athlete Jesse Owens. Dorian Harewood plays the Olympic gold-winning athlete. The drama won a 1985 Primetime Emmy Award and was nominated for two more. It originally premiered in syndication on July 9 and 10, 1984 as part of Operation Prime Time's syndicated programming.
Ah Chew Goo was an American basketball player and coach of the University of Hawaii men's basketball team, who was known primarily for his basketball dribbling and passing abilities.
Patricia Rose Breslin was an American actress and philanthropist. She had a prominent career in television, which included recurring roles as Amanda Miller on The People's Choice (1955–58), and as Laura Harrington Brooks on Peyton Place (1964–65). She also appeared in Go, Man, Go! (1954), and the William Castle horror films Homicidal (1961) and I Saw What You Did (1965).
Edge of the City is a 1957 American film-noir drama film directed by Martin Ritt in his directorial debut, and starring John Cassavetes and Sidney Poitier. Robert Alan Aurthur's screenplay was expanded from his original script, staged as the final episode of Philco Television Playhouse, A Man Is Ten Feet Tall (1955), also featuring Poitier.
"Jumpin" Jackie Jackson was an American professional basketball player. Jackson was one of the first streetball legends in the Rucker Playground Basketball Tournaments in New York City in the early 1960s. He went on to a 20-year career with the Harlem Globetrotters, earning his nickname by allegedly snatching a quarter from the top of a basketball backboard on a bet.
Harlem Magicians was a basketball enterprise founded in 1953 by Lon Varnell through his Varnell Enterprises, that was similar in fashion and activities to the famous exhibition basketball team the Harlem Globetrotters. The full name of the barnstorming basketball team was the Fabulous Harlem Magicians with the main star attraction of the team being Marques Haynes. Haynes had been a member of the Globetrotters, but had left the team due to a contract dispute to join the Magicians. Other famous players in the team were Goose Tatum, comic Sam "Boom" Wheeler, Josh Grider, Ron Cavenall, and Bob "Ergie" Erickson. Dempsey Hovland, founder of 20th Century Booking Agency and himself owner of several barnstorming teams, was recruited to book the Harlem Magicians' games.
Her Kind of Man is a 1946 American crime film noir directed by Frederick De Cordova, and starring Dane Clark, Janis Paige and Zachary Scott. The film is not to be confused with His Kind of Woman (1951) starring Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell.
Robert H. Karstens was a professional basketball player in the United States. Karstens was born in Davenport, Iowa and attended school at Iowa Central Turner Gym and St. Ambrose College. A white man, Karstens was the third non-black player on the Harlem Globetrotters' roster. First was owner Abe Saperstein as a substitute in the team's first year. Second was Rob Nichol a Canadian in 1941. He invented a few routines including the magic circle and the yo yo basketball. He played on the All Black Team, 8 years before the NBA was integrated. He stayed on as a team manager from 1954 to 1994. He died on December 31, 2004.
The 1948 Globetrotters–Lakers game was a dramatic match-up between the Harlem Globetrotters and the Minneapolis Lakers. Played in Chicago Stadium, the game took place two years before professional basketball was desegregated. The Globetrotters' 61–59 victory – by two points at the buzzer – challenged prevailing racial stereotypes about the abilities of black athletes.
Winfield Scott Welch, nicknamed "Gus" and "Moe", was an American Negro league outfielder and manager. Welch spent most of his playing career with minor Negro teams. He is best known as a successful manager, lauded by some as "the Connie Mack of Negro baseball"
Sweetwater is a 2023 American biographical sports film about Nat Clifton, the first African-American to sign a contract with the National Basketball Association (NBA). Written and directed by Martin Guigui, it stars Everett Osborne as Clifton, with Cary Elwes, Jeremy Piven, Richard Dreyfuss, and Kevin Pollak in supporting roles.
Inman William "Big Jack" Jackson was an American professional basketball player. He was a long-time member of the Harlem Globetrotters and was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2022.
